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Back On My Feet
By Anne Mahlum, Pennsylvania
Life, deceptively, appeared pretty easy for me. I had a very promising career, plenty of money and a respectable number of requests for my social calendar.
"Last spring, on my pre-dawn runs, I began to see a group of men hanging out, talking on the corner of a street in my neighborhood. As you can imagine, there weren’t a lot of people out and about at 5 a.m. so I waved and smiled as my legs carried me past them." -Anne Mahlum
But I didn’t feel fulfilled. In fact the only time I really felt that life was full of opportunities was, at 5 a.m. when I went running. My loneliness would disappear and I felt as though I could finally breathe on my own – unfettered by anyone else’s strings attached.
Warming up, I felt my body working in symphony with my mind and spirit. After a few miles, this euphoric calmness would penetrate every corner of my being. Because I got a taste of how I felt when I ran, I knew with everyone ounce of my being that there was more to life than the successes defined by our society.
And then….
Last spring, on my pre-dawn runs, I began to see a group of men hanging out, talking on the corner of a street in my neighborhood. As you can imagine, there weren’t a lot of people out and about at 5 a.m. so I waved and smiled as my legs carried me past them.
I sensed they were homeless because I knew there was a shelter nearby. As days passed, they knew my name and their cheers of encouragement were as dependable as the sunrise.
One day, I stopped. I turned around and thought - what am I doing? Here I am, moving my life forward in every way possible and I’m leaving these guys in the exact same spot. I’m going to take them with me.
I Goggled the name of the homeless shelter and emailed the Executive Director, Richard McMillen. I told him my idea and while he was a little shocked by my proposal, he agreed to present it to the men staying in the shelter. Nine guys were interested.
With a team waiting to run, I emailed everyone I knew asking them to donate shoes, clothes and money to support this new running club. I am still floored today when I think about the number of people who were so willing to give so much to get this going.
On July 3, 2007, the nine men from the Sunday Breakfast Rescue Mission joined me and we ran our first mile together. That day I felt something different. Although I wasn’t sure what it was then, it was a good different. And on Friday, July 5th – we ran again.
Around this same time, I had accepted a new job with Comcast. I asked if I could have five weeks to stabilize the running club as I knew my new job would require me to do a lot of traveling. They agreed.
In those five weeks my life completely changed. I began to see that the running club was a pure reflection of who I am and I owed it to myself -the self I had just discovered, to at least try and make the club work. So, I chose not to take the job at Comcast, and instead, I chose me.
As you can imagine, coming from North Dakota, my parents tried with all their might to convince me to take the job, which had more perks than I knew what to do to with. But none of that mattered to me because I knew I’d be walking into Comcast everyday thinking about all the people who I am not helping, and that was something I couldn’t live with.
Along with the extraordinary help of so many people, I was able to turn the running club into a very successful nonprofit called Back on My Feet, which is much more than just running. It’s a comprehensive program that offers connections to job training, educational scholarships and housing assistance for our members. The benefits of Back on My Feet are earned through the currency of attitude, commitment, teamwork, respect, dedication and leadership.
Despite our growing success people kept asking me if I was scared about ‘what-if’ scenarios. After all I am a 26 year old woman and I was running with a bunch of men who were down on their luck. I remember feeling so disappointed by these questions. The world moves so fast that we think it’s acceptable to put people into buckets based solely on a descriptive trait – like homeless or black or unemployed or blond. These words do not define us – character does.
Indeed I’m convinced the philosophy of Back on My Feet should be applied to all kinds of world issues. Unfortunately, when we confront many conflicts we keep taking a wrong turn. But imagine – if like Back on My Feet there are no labels, no stigmas and no stereotypes. We all become members of the same team regardless of race, education or socioeconomic status. We do not make judgments about each other based on our pasts –we join together to move lives forward and support each other’s future.
I distinctly remember one of our runs when there were eight of us in a pack ahead of the rest. I got us lost and we ended up in a neighborhood that didn’t have a Starbucks on every corner. One of the guys running with us said – We can’t run through there – it’s dangerous. I said – That’s exactly why we need to do it. If we turn around and run the other way we are contributing to the problem. Why don’t we run through with smiles on our faces and say good morning to everyone on the street. And that’s what we did.
Back on My Feet has taught me so much about myself, others and how to make our world a better place. One of the most best things I’ve learned is that it’s important to cross roads especially those we may have never crossed. Black, white, rich, poor…pardon my language, but who gives a shit.
We cannot choose the moments that change our lives and even when those moments happen we still have choices. I feel like there’s an earthquake inside of me when I get to see someone finish a run and I can see the hope and excitement in their eyes. We all need second chances and I am so incredibly blessed that those first nine men welcomed me into their lives. It is within the circles of Back on My Feet where I have found family and within that family, I found myself.
